


Fascination

by disgruntled_owl



Category: Dracula & Related Fandoms, Horror of Dracula (1958)
Genre: 19th Century, Backstory, Bavaria, Friendship, Hammer films, Libraries, Minor Character Death, Minor Original Character(s), Obsession, Pre-Canon, Vampire Decapitation, Vampire Hunters, Vampire Staking, Vampires, hammer horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-17
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-20 22:16:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17030982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/disgruntled_owl/pseuds/disgruntled_owl
Summary: An elegant stranger arrives at the Karlstadt Municipal Archive, seeking the histories of Bavarian nobles for a mysterious purpose. Librarian Jonathan Harker aids the visitor in his research and becomes captivated by him and his secret mission. As sinister events begin happening in Karlstadt, Harker sinks deeper into his obsession until he learns the dark truths that will change his life forever.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rosecake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosecake/gifts).



In the first days of my unlife, I wanted someone to blame. I did not kill Dracula, nor did I die a warrior’s death. I became a beast, with appetites too grotesque to name. I cursed Van Helsing for sacrificing me to the monster he hunted. Only later, here in the world beyond, have I learned to forgive him, and to appreciate how my own incurable fascination sealed my fate. To come to this realization, I had to return to the beginning.

I had watched Van Helsing approach for the first time from the second story windows of the Karlstadt Municipal Archive. Behind me, there had stood a mountain range of registers and ledgers, an avalanche of loose paper having already fallen on its foothills. I had been a librarian—dare I say an experienced one, having already managed collections at the University of Würzburg—and I  had been horrified to find that the elderly clerks at my new post in Karlstadt had let piles upon piles of provincial records all but calcify in disarray. My task was to try to restore some order to the place, a project my associates were happy to leave me to while they dozed behind desks and in dusty armchairs. For the three months before Van Helsing arrived, I had doggedly picked through this mess, with little more than creaking drawers and the chatter of my thoughts to engage me.

No rattling carriage wheels announced his arrival. I simply saw him standing in the thoroughfare, peering up at the building through the glare of the afternoon sunlight. Visitors were rare at the archive, and those who were neither portly public officials nor underfed students were rarer still. This stranger appeared to be neither. With his weathered valise in hand, he brought with him the air of a vagabond, air I was eager to breathe. I dropped my stack of papers and raced downstairs, terrified that my colleagues’ lethargy and suspicion would lead him to believe he was in the wrong place.

I ran to the foyer to find it empty, save for the dozing front desk clerk Herr Voigt. Through his snoring, I detected the gentle clap of shoe soles against tile and spotted the stranger sauntering towards one of the libraries. In there, mere silk cords would separate him from a labyrinth walled in by motley, overstuffed shelves, from which he might flee in horror or at least disgust.  

“I hope, distinguished sir, that you’ll accept help from a guide,” I called after him. “Few visitors escape the mess in there alive.”

He turned, offering a broad, generous grin in return for my attempt at a joke. Perhaps his journey had left him starved for company. “I think of myself an experienced traveler, but I can see from here that the way might be treacherous.” Though I addressed him in German, he had detected my accent and answered in impeccable English. The smells of dust and stagecoach stuffiness wafted from his greatcoat as he approached me, yet his gloves were immaculate. He handed me his card.

_J. Van Helsing. Physician. Doctor of Philosophy and Theology. Professor of Metaphysics. Leiden University._

“What an accomplished scholar such as yourself would want with our humble collection, I’m sure I have no idea,” I said with a laugh. “But I am Jonathan Harker, at your service.”  

At the other end of the room, Herr Voigt coughed and sputtered, then continued snoring apace.

“You might be surprised to learn that archives like this one often have the records I’m looking for,” he replied. “I will elaborate, but first, might I have a few moments off my feet?”

I ushered him upstairs to an office recently vacated by the late Doktor Wolff, the former head archivist. While he had passed on, the objects he treasured most in our local collection— ornate maps, an original copy of the city charter—still lined the walls of the room. Van Helsing absentmindedly dropped his valise and slipped out of his greatcoat, his gaze drawn to the rhythmic shimmer of gilded letters on the rows of leather book spines. That coat had disguised a lean, wiry figure, and I might have taken him for malnourished had his bearing and movements not been so refined. His face, with its sharp cheekbones and its crow’s feet, had been wizened by worry. Yet his hair was still dark and his smile easy, all in defiance—or so I fantasized—of whatever had brought him to Karlstadt.

“Please make yourself comfortable here,” I said. “I’ll bring you any materials you might require.  We’ve had a number of medical texts bequeathed to us, although-“

“I’ve actually come to conduct genealogical and historical research, Mr. Harker,” he interjected as he pulled a portfolio from his valise. “Though it was natural for you to assume otherwise; this work is somewhat beyond my areas of expertise.”

“With all the credentials on your card, I can’t imagine much of anything being out of your wheelhouse, Doctor Van Helsing.”

A flush spread over his pale cheeks. “It pertains to my work in diseases of the blood, you see,” he continued while thumbing through the contents of the portfolio. “I seek evidence of their spread both within and between the noble families of the German and Austro-Hungarian Empires. Many of these families sought to hide evidence of these maladies among their members so that they would be able to form successful marriage alliances. But the details omitted from formal family histories can sometimes be inferred through wills or death certificates, or they might appear in personal diaries—the sorts of things I hope to find here.”  

“And so your aim is to find the path of those diseases on the continent, and to determine who might be transmitting them and how.”

“Just so.” He kept his eyes on his papers as he spoke. I wondered how many other archivists in Bavaria Van Helsing thought he had fooled with this ruse. Still, the prospect of uncovering his hidden purpose thrilled me.

“And if you can trace that path, you hope to end it.”

Now he looked up. “Precisely.”

The word hung in the air. I searched his eyes for more. He held my gaze for several moments before a quizzical expression passed over his face and I realized how intently I had been staring. I offered him a contrite smile. “I imagine you have some families in mind?”

He returned an appeased one. “Any records you might have on the Hautzenbergs and the Blankfels, if you please.”

I slipped into an adjacent library to search for these items, praying that my months of categorizing would bear fruit. As I plucked books from shelves and papers from filing cabinets, I listened for Van Helsing’s movements in the next room. Eventually I heard him rise from Doktor Wolff’s desk and pace the floor, and through the crack in the door I saw him turn to the window. The light outside had deepened to amber, against which he formed a black silhouette. He remained there for several minutes, as though watching for something down in the street below.

I crept back into the office cradling my findings on the Blankfels and Hautzenbergs in one arm. Van Helsing kept his back remained to me, granting me an uninhibited view of the effects he left scattered on the desk. A map lay partially, tantalizingly unfolded beside his notebook. With my free hand I tugged back one corner to reveal swaths of scarlet and sepia, black capillaries spreading to patches of blue. Bohemia. Moravia. Galacia. Austria. Styria. Gold marks glinted in the sea of black labels. These were crosses in some spots, and in others, tiny circles, likely undetectable except to someone who might be looking for them.

Van Helsing’s frock coat rustled as he turned back toward me. I retreated several steps, and spread my documents across the desk, careful to nudge the map back into its original position. “I hope this will be enough to get you started. I’ll be back at my drudgery in the next room should you need more, although you might find me inclined to check on you. You’re a far more interesting  patron than we often get here.” My face grew hot; these words had escaped my lips before decorum or common sense could censor them.

“You seem rather critical of your post, Mr. Harker,” he said, a playful tone returning to his voice. “I take it you are accustomed to busier, or perhaps more sophisticated, environments.”

“Your powers of detection are quite keen, Doctor. I imagine you’re very successful at your research.”

“May I ask what drew you to Karlstadt, then?”

“Truly, sir? Blue eyes, creamy skin, and a charming laugh.” I chuckled and shook my head. “The things we do for love.”

He nodded politely but did not ask anything more. I bowed and left him to his work.

The materials I sorted through next might have been tax records or death warrants, I could not have told you which. My ear was attuned to every scratch of Van Helsing’s pen, every whisper of paper, every creak of his desk chair. I was sure the flimsy purpose he proffered for his visit hid some more sinister intrigue, and my mind conjured wild possibilities. Espionage. Conspiracy. Blackmail. His sophisticated manner would charm any ordinary person out of their suspicions, therefore I suspected him of everything. I would later find that the circumstances that brought him to Karlstadt were far worse than any my imagination could have devised.

Church bells tolled as the hours passed. Van Helsing called for me to fetch materials only once—otherwise, he didn’t so much as glance in my direction, so immersed was he in his work. Before long, the doors of the archive began to groan as my fellow archivists departed for the night.

“Forgive me, Doctor Van Helsing, but I cannot keep the archive open any longer,” I told him. “I can, however, leave these materials just here in the office so that you might return to them in the morning.”

He looked up from his journal at me, or rather through me, his face hardening as if he had come to some dreadful realization. I began to turn off the taps for the gas lamps, and the spread of shadows caught his eyes and stirred him from his thoughts.  

“Why yes, of course, you must. It is late.” He rose, massaging his neck, and approached the window once more. This time, he drew close to the glass, as though he finally saw the object he had expected. I sidled up behind him, hoping to catch a glimpse for myself, but my reflection in the window glass alerted him and he spun back towards me.

“I trust you have adequate lodgings in town,” I said, handing him his coat.

“The Hotel Bayer, yes,” he replied, gathering up his notes and map. “If you are leaving anyhow, would you be so kind as to point me in its direction?”

I smiled ruefully to myself. There would be no opportunity for me to explore his materials tonight.  

Van Helsing and I left the archive together, every light in the building behinds us extinguished except for the lantern above the front doors. The darkness beyond the steps was thick, damp, and somehow charged, yet no thunder rumbled above the rooftops. We exchanged amicable nothings as I ushered him through the isolated streets toward the lantern-lit Konigstrasse, As we walked, his gaze flitted from my face to the black mouths of alleyways and stairwells to cellar doors. There were several instances when I thought I heard the scrape of shoe leather or the clatter of roof tiles several paces away–at each of these moments, Van Helsing engaged me in a fresh bout of conversation.

Once we reached the thoroughfare and Van Helsing headed off to the hotel, I looked back into the lonely, shuttered passageways. “Show yourself!” I called out, with a heedlessness I would not know again after that night. Nothing moved. I advanced several steps and caught glimmers of red in the dark. Clouds swept past to the reveal the moon, and cold white light striped the offending objects: lamp posts, fences, and railings. In the distance, horse hooves clapped against cobblestones, and I shook my head at the desperation of my imagination.

***

I dined that night at the table of my future brother-in-law, Arthur Holmwood, yet my thoughts remained in Doktor Wolff’s office, trying to divine Van Helsing’s purpose with my murky memories of his documents. Arthur regaled his dinner companions—his wife Mina, me, and my beloved Lucy—with a re-enactment of his most recent negotiation at his export firm. As he droned on, my gaze fell on the gold detailing on the china plates, which recalled the gold symbols on Van Helsing’s map. What could these marks, spread all over Europe, signify? Would Van Helsing find something in our archive that would make him place such a mark over Karlstadt?

I heard a rising note in Lucy’s voice and discovered that all around the table were looking at me. Blood rushed to my cheeks, for I had no reply. Lucy’s expression softened in pity. “All I said was: once our dear Jonathan reforms that archive, scholars and officials from all over Germany will be coming to visit it. Isn’t that right, my darling?”

“Oh,” I replied, with a small, relieved laugh. “Yes, of course. And then all the toil will have been worth it, I’m sure.” Arthur offered a half-approving smirk. Lucy beamed, and beneath the table I felt her stocking-clad foot caress my ankle. Van Helsing’s name crept to the tip of my tongue, offering me the chance to counter Arthur with my own boast. Yet, I swallowed my secret, sank my knife down into my piece of roast, and watched its juices spread to the edges of my plate.


	2. Chapter 2

Cold dew still clung to the windows when I returned to the archive the next day. I was dead set on being the first to arrive, not only to receive the doctor before my colleagues could mishandle him but also to examine the documents he had left behind last evening. The words on their pages, which I had heretofore skimmed just long enough to classify the texts, now appeared to me as tea leaves or animal bones. Friedrich von Blankfel’s daughter Gertrud married at age nineteen, only for the union to be dissolved by her twenty-first birthday, forcing her to return to her parents. Karl von Hautzenberg’s wife gave birth to fifteen children, fourteen of whom died before they turned three. His granddaughter Anna bemoaned her menstrual symptoms in vivid descriptions in her journal, claiming that the loss of blood brought her to the brink of death. Each detail was a length of gossamer thread, too flimsy to be knotted into any meaningful whole. 

I abandoned my augury before long and continued my cataloging while I waited for Van Helsing to return. Each time the doorbells chimed, I trotted to the top of the stairs, only to be disappointed to see another archivist trudge through the doors, still yawning. I grew more and more listless as the morning stretched on. When the church bells tolled noon, I forced myself to reckon with the possibility that he might not come back. I chided myself for my childishness. Either he found what he needed or determined its absence; either was a natural outcome. Few came to the archive at all and Van Helsing had been an aberration among those who did. I had been foolish to fixate on him, allowing myself to get attached. 

Still, he had anticipated a follower when he departed last night. And there was his own purpose, still hidden in half-truths. If I had trailed him, I would know more. The curiosity that had burrowed into my every thought might now be sated. 

Before I took my afternoon tea, I finally saw that distinct figure heading for the archive, valise in hand, greatcoat hem sweeping about his legs. Van Helsing approached me in the graceful manner he did yesterday, but I detected fatigue, even strain in his movements. Dark rings circled his eyes and his cheeks, though clean-shaven, were sallow. My imagination came alive again, with a touch of envy for whatever adventure had exhausted him so. 

“Please, come upstairs and have some tea, Dr. Van Helsing,” I said, collecting his coat. The cold air from outside masked any scent the fabric might have collected on his travels. “You’ll find your materials from yesterday undisturbed.” 

“You were generous to keep them set aside for me,” he said as we ascended the steps to Doktor Wolff’s office, “but I am afraid I will need another set entirely.”

Perhaps there had been no message in those bones after all. “Of course, Doctor. What shall I bring you instead?” 

He swept into the office and began setting out his journal and inkwell. “Any records you might have on the Messenbachs.”

“The Messenbachs.” I paused in the doorway. “Now we need to tread carefully.”

“I understand they own the forests and farmland just north of Karlstadt, and that castle on the hill, too. I imagine you all have more dealings with them than the others.”

“That’s true, but not the only reason to be cautious. Every mention of the Messenbachs has been made with the utmost delicacy since the Baron and his son died.” 

He dropped his writing materials. “How long ago was this?”

“Not long after I came to Karlstadt, so perhaps two or three months ago.” I set a filled teacup before him and he closed his hands around it, never breaking eye contact with me. “My brother-in-law told me the young Baron Messenbach managed the family’s investments in mining and plantations in Kamerun. People say his wanderlust drove him to visit the colony himself. Two months after he reached Africa, the colonial administrator in Bamenda reported him dead.”

“My God. How did the man die? Disease? Insurrection?” 

“An infection, though I do not know if it was one of the hematological disorders you study. They sent back an urn rather than a coffin, making it impossible to tell. But for the elder Baron, they know. When he received the news of his son’s death, he suffered a heart attack and died the next day.” 

Van Helsing set aside his tea to scribble several lines in his journal. From my discreet distance, I could not make out what he wrote. “The funeral was quite the event,” I went on, watching to see what else he might record. “You’ll still see black bunting on many of the windows in town. For weeks after, nobles came from throughout Germany, and perhaps beyond, to pay their respects.” 

“How much of the family is left?”

“Only the Baron’s wife, Margrethe von Messenbach. No other heirs. She’s been in seclusion since the funeral. She has her servants to attend to her affairs, I suppose, although I hear even they have been seldom seen these past few weeks.”

Van Helsing set down his pen. Again, he stared through me, pursing his lips, which emphasized his sunken cheeks. What terror consumed his thoughts, I wondered. What plan was churning in that brain? 

“You say few have seen the baroness,” he said, primarily to himself, “and so few would know about her own health.” 

“You understand the sensitivity of all of this, I hope, Doctor,” I replied. “People here are still reeling from the tragedy that befell the Messenbachs. I’ll do all I can to assist you, but others in Karlstadt may not look kindly on a foreigner digging into their deaths, even if for medical research. Many of the townsfolk are superstitious enough as it is.” 

Something kindled in his eyes, setting the blue in them aflame. “We will put aside the matter of the Messenbachs for the moment. Do you keep newspapers here?” I nodded. “Bring me everything from the past six weeks.” 

“Six weeks, Doctor? That’s quite a lot of material. If you give me any details on what you are looking for, I might be able to pare-“

“I won’t know exactly what I’m looking for until I see it,” he interrupted. Seeing the shock, and perhaps hurt, on my face, he softened and rested his hand on my wrist. “Please, Mr. Harker. Anything you could bring me.” 

I returned with a cart laden down with a tower of newsprint, so tall I needed to rest my hand on the top sheets to keep them from fluttering away. His face brightened as he saw me enter, which flattered and emboldened me. “You really ought to allow me to help you, Dr. Van Helsing,” I said. “I sense that you need to find your evidence with some urgency. Would I be right?”

The color drained from his face. He studied me, his lips always on the verge of parting, as though he had a statement he kept biting back. Finally, he shut his eyes and released a resigned sigh. “I’m looking for any news of spreading illnesses, not only among people but animals as well. And should you see any mention of missing persons or animal attacks, please bring those to my attention.” 

I eyed him, baffled by what might connect animals to blood disorders or even blackmail. Still, I held my tongue, lest I be torn away from this keyhole view of his plans. I posted myself across from him at Doktor Wolff’s desk. Fueled by the tea, and later tobacco, we pored through the pile of newspapers. Van Helsing read with such focus that I could no longer suspect that this exercise was a ruse to throw me off his scent. If I could find some morsel to offer him, perhaps I would be able to earn more of his trust. 

At long last, I found such a thing: a passage describing a reported wolf attack on several cattle three weeks ago. Each creature’s throat had a ring of bite marks, but to the farmer’s surprise, no flesh had been torn from their bodies. This was not the behavior of a hungry wolf or lynx creeping out of the forest in search for food. As I proudly passed Van Helsing the page, I looked up at the windows and saw the sky outside had darkened to a bruise blue. No footsteps, snorts, coughs, or grunts sounded in other parts of the archive—my colleagues had all left, and this time, without my noticing. 

The gloom outside caught Van Helsing’s eye as well. “Again, I’ve paid no heed to the passing of time,” he said, sweeping mussed strands of hair back from his face. “I expect you need to close the archive for the night.” 

“There’s still much more to do, isn’t there?” I said. “I will stay with you as long as you wish to continue.” The expression of gratitude that swept over his face all but bewitched me. “Keep reading while I find a messenger—I won’t be gone a moment.” 

Before Van Helsing could say another word, I hurried downstairs and out the front doors, locking them behind me. The streets nearby were deserted, as they had been the night before, and I had to walk several blocks to Konigstrasse before I found a lad pacing through the gas lantern beams. “You there, young man,” I called out, luring him over with a five-mark note. “Bring this message to Arthur and Lucy Holmwood at 1311 Wilhelmstrasse: Jonathan Harker has been called away on official business, and will not be dining with them this evening. He sends his apologies and regards.” The boy snatched the note from my fingers and took off, winding his way between the hansom cabs and horses. 

Official business. I rolled over the term in my mind myself as I walked back to the archive. The Holmwoods would demand an explanation for that when I saw them tomorrow night. I had twenty-four hours to come up with a more convincing alibi.

As I approached the building entrance, I peered up at the windows, seeking the reassurance of Van Helsing waiting there for me. Instead, they were empty and the room beyond them was suspiciously dim, as though someone had extinguished half of the gas lights. Before I took another step, I saw a giant black shape sweep across the window bank, and I froze. For the length of several heartbeats, the panes remained blank. Then, a strange mass slammed against the surface of the glass, arms undulating, fingers fanning out and radiating pain. 

My heart in my throat, I forced out of my stupor and towards the doors. I stifled the tremors in my fingers as I slid my key into the lock, hoping to avoid detection by whatever lurked upstairs. Only the foyer was lit: the first floor libraries and filing rooms beyond were pitch black. Above me, shattered glass rang out and books and furniture thundered as they hit the floor. Feet scuffled. Chair legs squealed. Van Helsing roared until his voice was subsumed by snapping wood. 

I snuck upstairs through the dark stairwell and ducked behind a bookcase just beyond the landing. Faint rays of streamed from Doktor Wolff’s office, and through the doorway I saw a figure clad in all black lunge at Van Helsing and wrap his hands around his throat. Van Helsing grabbed his assailant’s arms, trying to force him off. The stranger shoved him out of view, and, I heard them both smash against the wall, Van Helsing gasping for air as framed documents crashed down around him. 

Summoning all my courage, I crept to the door. There was a whiff of gas in the air, and I could see that in their struggle, they had shattered several of the light fixtures besides Herr Doktor Wolff’s map gallery. The intruder’s back was to me as he staggered through the wreckage and forced Van Helsing into the corner. In the paltry glow of an oil lamp on the desk, he appeared as an unbroken shadow sweeping over his victim. I grabbed a volume off a nearby shelf and hurled it at his head. The stranger tumbled forward onto Van Helsing, moaning as he struggled to find purchase. I dashed forward, grabbed the collar of his tunic, and dragged him backward. In a supernaturally quick movement, the intruder spun around, pushed me down, and pinned me to the floor. His wild eyes flashed above me, and putrescent breath wafted from a mouth full of gleaming teeth. 

Suddenly, Van Helsing loomed over us both, blood trickling from his nose down over his lip. Before he could lay hands on my attacker, the stranger leapt over me, narrowly missing the desk. Van Helsing’s map lay open there, the shimmer of its symbols catching the lamplight. As though alerted by my gaze, the attacker snatched up the map and hurled the oil lamp at what remained of Doktor Wolff’s gallery. 

Flames fed by newsprint and spilled oil spread over the floor and raced up the walls. Smoke billowed around me, stinging my eyes and shrouding everything else in the room. Beyond the fire’s crackle I could hear racing footsteps. I dropped to my knees to escape the smoke, and there I confronted the horror of what was happening. All around me, tongues of flame licked irreplaceable documents, consumed centuries-old records, devoured unrecoverable histories. I knelt there, trembling, transfixed in my panic. 

“Harker!” Van Helsing bellowed, sweeping away the black clouds. “Harker, we must go!” 

“We have to stop it!” I cried. “We have to put it out! It will destroy everything!” I realized that Van Helsing’s own materials were lost in this mess, and my panic redoubled. 

“It’s too late! Come on, before it destroys you, too!” 

I summoned just enough presence of mind to take his hand. He dragged me out into the corridor and down the steps. Outside, I could hear the clamor of fire bells and shouts from the street. The back door to the archive hung open, ushering in a blast of cold air from the alley. In the foyer, the front doors rattled beneath pounding hands. 

Van Helsing pulled me toward the back doorway, where he stopped and closed his hands over mine. “Harker,” he said, “I beg you to forgive me, but I must go after that man. Please, do whatever you can to keep the way clear for me. If the constables or members of the fire brigade detain me, I’ll lose my chance to catch him.” 

“Doctor Van Helsing,” I panted, still woozy from the smoke. “I don’t understand.” 

“There’s no time for me to explain,” he said. “Please, just hold them off until I can get away.” Seeing nothing but confusion in my eyes, he squeezed my hands harder, gave me a mournful look, and then dashed out into the alleyway. I stood there in a daze, listening to his footsteps recede, until a loud crack against the front doors returned me to my senses. I lurched forward, threw them open, and collapsed into the flood of townspeople that rushed into the archive. 

***

The constables escorted me from the burning archive while the fire brigade and townspeople battled the flames. At the constabulary, they questioned me for what felt like hours. I told them every detail I could remember about the black-clad intruder and the havoc he had caused in the archive office. When the officers asked if there had been any other witnesses, I kept my promise to Van Helsing and said nothing. Nor did I reveal my suspicion that the stranger had been the threat that Van Helsing had been watching for the night before. At the time, I told myself I owed this loyalty to the man who had saved my life. In truth, I was not ready to surrender this mystery to someone else.

Arthur sent his carriage for me, and I found every Holmwood and servant still awake when I arrived at their house. Arthur brought me brandy, Mina brought me blankets, and Lucy perched on the sofa beside me and cleaned lingering soot off my face. So immersed in my thoughts was I that I barely felt her touch as she tended to me. Had Van Helsing found the stranger that fled the archive? I wondered. If he did, had he survived a second encounter?

“Criers were running down the streets shouting about it,” Arthur said, continuing a story that my clouded mind, up till now, had blocked out. “When I reached the building, the whole the second story was a burnt-out shell. You could see how the fire had charred everything inside.”

“I can’t bear the thought of it now,” I croaked. Lucy kissed my temple, the touch of her lips faint as snow.

“Dreadful,” Mina murmured. “All of those records, simply gone.”

“And all that work,” Arthur went on. “You were finally beginning to bring some order to that place. Now it will take you months to sift through what managed to survive the fire, let alone begin to replace what was lost.” 

“What I can’t understand,” Lucy said, “Is why the strange man you saw would have come to the archive tonight to destroy books and papers that have been there for centuries?” 

I took a long draw from my brandy snifter and receded further from them. What knowledge, or what plot, had that stranger sought to destroy by attacking Van Helsing?


	3. Chapter 3

The young woman staffing the counter of the Hotel Bayer was wary of me from the start. My face was still scratched up from the incident last night, and my clipped speech signaled trouble. “It’s a Doctor Van Helsing you’re looking for, mister?” she asked. 

“Yes, miss, as I said. A man between forty and fifty, with prominent cheekbones, who speaks German with an accent much like mine. He’s either here or he isn’t—please hurry up and let me know.”

“Just a minute, just a minute, please.” She paid no mind to my description and grunted as she hoisted a massive, ragged register book onto the counter. “We don’t get much in the way of visitors this early in the morning.” The book exhaled dust as she thumbed through its pages. Between sneezes, I watched for the tell-tale van in the column of names and slapped my hand down on the book when it appeared. Beside his name, the innkeepers had scrawled the number twelve. 

“He hasn’t paid yet, and he still has his key,” the woman said, growing annoyed, “so unless he’s some kind of thief, he’s still here.” 

“Then would you kindly—”

A hand landed on my shoulder. ”My dear Mr. Harker.” Van Helsing flashed a grin as he circled around to meet me. “So good of you to visit. I was just taking my breakfast; I hope you’ll join me.” His voice brimmed with the same gentility it had when we first met. His eyes were bloodshot and the circles beneath them had grown darker, yet he was dressed and groomed flawlessly, smelling of linen and lavender. Last night’s events had left nary a mark on him. 

He pressed a hand on my back and guided me into the dining room. The ceiling panels and window trim were made of reddish brown oak, which made the room seem to close in around us. Aside from a waitress making lethargic loops near the kitchen doorway, we were alone. 

“I’m relieved to see you out and relatively unharmed after last night’s commotion,” he said as he poured me coffee from a pot left on the table. “I passed near the archive and was horrified by the devastation. If there’s anything I can do for you or your colleagues—”

“Did you find the man?” I blurted out. “Did you find the map?” 

His eyes flashed in reproach. He sipped his coffee. “The man is gone,” he replied, his tone restrained. “But I was able to recover my map. I owe much to you for that.”

“That man meant to kill you,” I said, setting my cup aside and leaning across the table. “Who was he, and what did he want with your map?”

This time he scowled, his nostrils flaring. “Please, keep your voice down.” He took a deep breath to steady himself. “I never saw that man before last night, though it’s certainly possible that he followed me, believing I carried valuables. I travel alone, and foreigners are always vulnerable in unfamiliar lands.” A melancholy expression spread over his face as he said this, and my heart softened. “As for the map, it is precious to me because it captures key details of my research. What it meant to him, I can’t imagine, except that it is a well-made document. Perhaps this bandit thought it was something worth stealing.” 

My cheeks burned with shame. Though he and I had experienced something extraordinary, I alone had cast these events and Van Helsing’s actions in a conspiratorial light. I had been so hungry for a diversion that I wove fantasy into reality. What’s more, I was at least partially to blame for what happened. Had I closed the archive on time, Van Helsing might have returned to the hotel before the thief began his prowl. Had I remained in the archive instead of running out for a messenger, the villain might never have dared to come inside. 

I sighed and massaged my brow. “Forgive me, Doctor. I should not forget that you suffered last night, too. Nor should I forget I owe you more than you do me. Had you not reached for me when I panicked, I don’t know where I would be now.” 

He placed his hand over mine. Despite all the intrigue that preceded that moment, and all the revelations and tribulations that would follow, I knew, and have never forgotten, that the show of friendship in this gesture was genuine.

“You must have lost some of your own notes in that fire,” I went on. “And I expect our archive will do you little good now. What will you do?”

“I’ll need to continue my research one way or another,” he said. I felt a pang of disappointment as he pulled his hand away. “I suppose I could travel to Gossenheim or to the university in Hammelburg if need be.” 

I recalled the massive book on the counter in the hotel entryway. “Don’t go, not just yet.” I blanched at my own eagerness. "I mean, there is still the parish register, which is safe at the church. It won’t be as detailed as what we had at the archive, but there will be notes on births, marriages, deaths. I could bring you there.” His eyes widened in assent. 

We hastened from the hotel to the Church of Saint Andreas, which towered over the buildings in the western quarter of the village. Morning mass had ended by the time we arrived, and the crowds exiting the church had thinned to a trickle. As we approached the entrance, I watched for the priest and for parishioners who might recognize me from my visits with the Holmwoods. The Messenbachs were still on Van Helsing’s mind, and the fewer distrustful townsfolk we encountered, the better.

We were fortunate to find the vestry unlocked and a duplicate of the parish register stored on the top shelf of an armoire filled with vestments. “You’ll need some privacy to examine this,” I said. “We might find that in the crypt. I have no desire to be morbid—though, as a doctor, you may have a stronger stomach for that than me—but down there, we should have less need to explain ourselves.”

Van Helsing laughed. “I am quite comfortable among the dead, Mr. Harker, if it means I will find what I’m looking for.” I grinned, delighted that I had amused him. 

We descended a stairwell beside the sacristy to reach the crypt, which was as desolate as I had hoped. We found our way to a remote spot by the light of an oil lamp. Van Helsing settled on the stone floor, paying no mind to the moisture and dust collecting on his fine trousers. I hovered behind him to hold the lamp, a massive stone coffin at my back.

From my post, I gained my closest view of his work yet. He flipped immediately to the end of the register and turned back from its final blank pages until he found the record of Baron Messenbach’s funeral six weeks ago. Beside the Baron’s name and death date, the priest had clearly inscribed his cause of death: heart disease. From there Van Helsing pored over every line, pausing every now and then to scribble the causes of death in his notebook with a graphite pencil. Yet I soon realized that all the records on which Van Helsing lingered shared two words—unconsecrated ground.

My doubts from yesterday resurfaced. Again his investigation had taken a nonsensical turn. After his bravery last night, I wanted to cast aside my fantasies and believe he told me the truth about his mission. But the increasing peculiar objects of his search—mutilated animals, burials in unhallowed earth—all indicated some ulterior purpose. 

He had trusted me enough to let me bring him here. We were alone. There would be no better time to ask. 

“The Messenbachs themselves are not buried here, are they, Harker?” Van Helsing asked.

I rose and stepped back, taking the light with me. Van Helsing clapped the book shut and sprang to his feet. “Did you hear something?” 

“Doctor Van Helsing.” I swallowed hard. “I don’t doubt your intentions. I don’t believe you are anything but a good man. But nor do I believe that you’ve come to Karlstadt to do medical research. Every scrap of information you’ve collected points to some other motive. Tell me what you’re really doing here."

In the dim circle of lamplight, I saw his brow furrow. “You’ve gathered more than you’ve let on, Harker,” he replied, his voice low and resigned. 

“I don’t mean you any trouble. When the constables questioned me last night, I did not tell them your name. We’ve helped each other, have we not? All I want is for you to tell me the truth.” 

He slid the register across the face of the tombstone. I braced myself for him to flee but he simply stood there, holding my gaze.

“You have been kind to me, Mr. Harker,” he said. “I’m greatly indebted to you for all that you’ve done, and for what you’ve endured. The best way I can repay you is to tell you this: return this register to the vestry, leave this church, and forget. Forget that I ever came to Karlstadt.”

“The archive is in ruins!” I cried, my voice echoing off the tombs. “I almost lost my life! How can I forget that?”

“I can’t change those things now. I can only protect you and your loved ones from more of their kind. Please, trust me, and do as I tell you.”

“Why won’t you tell me what’s going on, after all that has happened? Why won’t you trust me?”

He reached out again through the dark and took my hand once more. “I have every reason to trust you, Jonathan. You’ve taken great risks even in bringing me here. But you should return to the archive, or at least to the constabulary or the magistrate’s office. Even if you spoke to officials yesterday, your colleagues will be suspicious, especially if they know you were the last librarian in the archive before the fire. Those suspicions will run higher if you don’t give them some account of what happened. I don’t want to see you suffer any more because of me.”

I snatched my hand away from him and clutched the lid of the sarcophagus. My breath grew shallow, my stomach queasy. What was I doing here, with pilfered church records, surrounded by moldering corpses? I had been indulging a stranger, risking my reputation and safety for a man who would soon leave Karlstadt, never to be heard from again. I had been indulging myself, chasing a mystery only to find destruction and pain. 

I wanted this spell to end. If I said another word to him, it would only grow stronger. I cradled the register in the crook of my arm, picked up the lamp, and headed back toward the stairs. I could hear the clap of Van Helsing’s footsteps as trailed me through the crypt. By the time I emerged into the sunlight, they had vanished.

*** 

I returned to the center of town in a daze. Irritated pedestrians on Konigstrasse brushed past me and more than one hansom cab stopped short to let me pass. I craved sleep. I craved drink. I wanted nothing more to curl up beside Lucy and rest my head on her bosom. I wanted just what Dr. Van Helsing had prescribed; to forget it all, and to wake tomorrow with no mission but to begin setting the archive to rights. 

“Herr Harker! Herr Harker!” an unfamiliar voice called from behind me. I turned to find passersby stopping and a constable jogging toward me. “Herr Harker, wait!” I waited against a building until he was close enough to address me discreetly. “We’ve found someone who matches the man you described as starting the fire at the archive,” he said. “Will you come with me to identify him?”

I grimaced—so much for forgetting. Still, I held out hope that if I saw the fiend behind bars, I might be better able to put the whole affair behind me. “Of course. I’ll come straight away.” 

My heart began to race when we entered the constabulary. My last memory of the man was of his furious face looming over me as he held me against the floor, and the prospect of seeing him even in a cell now unnerved me. But my blood turned cold when the officer led me past the jail and down into a brick corridor. The air here was tinged with alcohol and putrefaction, and over the constable’s shoulder I saw slabs covered in white cloth.”

“We found this suspect’s remains in a refuse pile in the alleyways near Ettstrasse early this morning,” the constable said as he waved over an apron-clad assistant. “He seems to have met a pretty dreadful end, but there was enough left of him to suggest a match.”

His assistant swept back the sheet. I gripped the edge of the table hard to keep from swooning. A gap as wide as my palm separated this man’s head from the rest of his body. The eyes were undoubtedly those of the villain who attacked Van Helsing and me, still filled with rage even after death. The undersides of his lips had brown stains on them, as though they had been singed. The rest of the body was still clad in the black garb he wore when he broke into the archive. Something had torn a hole in his tunic just above his breastbone. The fabric around it was matted with blood, and light slithered upon the slick tissue at its bottom. A fat, bruised bulb of garlic rested on the table on his right side, and a wooden stake, its tip turned crusty and crimson, lay on his left. 

“We found the head close to the rest of him—a stroke of good fortune, I suppose,” the constable continued. “The stake was lodged in his chest, and we found the garlic crammed in his mouth.” 

Van Helsing’s grim face flashed in my mind. “The man is gone,” he had said, and I had not thought to question the cold resolution in his voice. 

“I am certain that this is the man that set fire to the archive,” I declared. It was all I could do to suppress the quaver in my voice. 

The assistant replaced the sheet. The constable led me to a desk and handed me a pen. I absentmindedly scrawled my signature on the affidavit, my thoughts in a whirl. 

“I suppose you’re relieved that this madman is no longer running loose in Karlstadt,” the constable said, “though I suppose we now have another to look for.”

I nodded, wondering what sort of madman I had left behind at the church.


	4. Chapter 4

I had come to the Hotel Bayer that morning agitated—I came there that afternoon in a fever. For all I knew, Van Helsing had shed this man’s blood, seemingly in some grotesque ritual, and was even less innocent even than the one he had killed. I led him to sensitive information, hid his existence from the authorities, and then turned my back on him, leaving him to his mysterious mission. I had to figure out his plan before my worst fears were realized. 

I drummed my fingers on the counter as the fat hotel manager ambled toward me. “Doctor Van Helsing, in Room Twelve,” I all but barked. “Is he still here?” 

The innkeeper smirked at me as he opened up his snuff-box, amused by my impatience. “The gentleman went is out, sir. On all accounts, he left his things here, though. You might try back later, or I could let him know you came.”

I forced myself to calm down—attracting attention would not help matters. “I’ve brought something for him,” I continued, turning my voice sickly sweet. “Would you be so kind as to escort me to his room so that I might leave it there?” I reached inside my jacket for my billfold, holding the man’s gaze to ensure he understood the meaning behind my gesture. 

“The gentleman’s request was that no-one enter that room but him, not even the maids. Paid me handsomely to keep that request, too.” He inhaled a pinch of snuff and I dropped my billfold back down into my pocket. “You can leave whatever it is with me if you like.”

I bit my lip, wishing I’d invented a better ruse before I arrived. “It’s no matter,” I said, giving him a curt nod. “I’ll come back later this evening.” Before he could ask my name, I headed back out into the street. 

The hotel building was flanked by alleyways on either side. When I say with Van Helsing in the dining room earlier that day, I noticed that a bank of windows on the far wall faced one alley, with the tables arranged to face away from its unimpressive view. I darted around the front of the building and down this passage and peeked inside. As it was late afternoon, the room was dark and empty and the tables had been stripped of their tablecloths. I turned back and, with a sharp jab of my elbow, I shattered one of the window panes. 

Shouts and the thunder of footsteps rang out in the next room. As I headed back towards the hotel entrance, I caught sight of several waiters racing into the dining room, the hotel manager waddling behind them. Finding the foyer empty, I slipped behind the front desk, snatched the key for Room Twelve off of the rack, and darted upstairs. 

I unlocked Van Helsing’s door and staggered back at the overpowering odor of garlic. Vases stuffed with papery brown blooms lined the dresser. Someone had wound desiccated leaves and stems wound through the window latches. Fat white bulbs dangled against the glass, just like the one that had been wedged into the dead man’s mouth. Though my eyes watered, I shut the door behind me. 

A large suitcase lay closed on the meticulously made bed. When I reached for the clasps, my fingers trembled. I wanted to forget, to rid myself of this fascination. The sight of the corpse, and now the garlic, had driven me down this dark path again—what I found inside this case might make turning back impossible. I stroked the leather as I gathered my thoughts. If I walked away now, or even if I went to back to the constabulary, Van Helsing would have time to flee or worse, used his new knowledge to some unspeakable end. Steeling my resolve, I opened the case. 

The surface items were disarmingly ordinary. I threw aside his jackets and toothpowder and unrolled his pajamas, which swaddled a metal frame containing two photographs. The first image was of a dark-haired, unsmiling woman, who appeared to be staring somewhere far beyond the camera lens. Her features suggested that she was once a beauty, but that something had drained that essence from her. The second picture was of a young boy, his smile faint but his sparkling eyes betraying his curiosity. I noticed a resemblance in the flare of his cheekbones. 

Below his clothes lay a canvas drawstring bag, the contents of which made a clattering sound as I lifted it out of the suitcase. When I reached inside, something pricked the palm of my hand. As I jumped back in pain, I dropped the bag and five sharpened wooden stakes tumbled out onto the floor. 

At the bottom of the suitcase, nestled in his leather portfolio, I found his map. This time I spread it all the way open. The shimmering gold symbols that once enchanted me now filled me with dread. I raised the map closer to my eyes and noticed that a golden circle had been inscribed above the name Karlstadt. Why a circle? Why not a cross? Why had he seen fit to mark this place at all?

I hunted about the room for any other item that would reveal what Van Helsing planned to do. The dresser drawers were empty. He had left every other surface in the room clean save for his wretched garlic. I knelt by the hearth and pawed through the ashes in search of documents he tried to destroy. Several charred bits of paper lay beneath the grate, and one piece that clung to the fireback still had a patch of white. “M-e-s-s-e-n,” I read aloud. If Van Helsing still sought the Messenbachs out, there was one place left for him to go. 

***  
Daylight was already vanishing as I trekked to the Castle Rothberg, the Messenbach family residence. The soaring oaks and spruces in their forest draped me in shadow, and I took care to mind the position of the sun as I made my way to the crest of the hill. I told no one where I was going. I carried my Mauser pistol, three of Van Helsing’s wooden stakes, a bulb of his garlic, and his map. 

This castle once appeared modest compared to many I had seen in Bavaria, but on this night, it formed a forbidding silhouette against the reddening sky. The fortress itself seemed to mourn its fallen inhabitants. Heaps of dried flowers lay at the bases of the giant stone urns that bordered the carriage drive. Not a soul, or even an animal, moved about the grounds, and the lightless windows formed black mouths upon the castle’s face. 

I distracted myself from these eerie surroundings by contemplating Van Helsing’s movements. If he was looking for Margarethe von Messenbach, he might be anywhere in the castle. He had perhaps tipped his hand in the church crypt when he had asked about the Messenbach’s burial places. I had witnessed the Baron’s funeral procession and knew that his body had been interred in the family vault on the castle grounds. In cataloging documents for the archive, I had seen maps of the Messenbach properties which had included the chapel that provided access to this underground vault. The darkness grew thick as I deliberated. I gambled on searching the chapel first while I still had enough light to find it. 

I found the small Gothic structure at the far reaches of the property, where it marked the threshold between the castle lawn and the forest to the west. Owls sounded in the treetops above it, and I scanned the spaces between the boughs for the flashing eyes of predators. The chapel door yielded to me easily and opened on to a small chamber lit by two torches. This space was curiously bare—it contained pews and an altar in the apse, but it was empty of crosses or religious artwork. 

The floor opened onto a set of stairs which led down to another door. As I descended, I could see light flowing from beneath it. I pressed my ear to the wood and heard rustling and footsteps in the vault beyond. I cocked my pistol and nudged open the door, which announced me with a squeal. 

The sight in the next room curdled my blood. Van Helsing loomed over an open sarcophagus, a stake in one hand and a wooden mallet in the other, his face set in grisly determination. When he saw me enter, he bolted upright and his expression melted into sorrow.

“I told you to stay away, Jonathan,” he said, his voice faltering. “Listen to me: turn back. Run from this place. It’s not safe here.”

I raised the pistol. “I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what you’re doing here.”

“Go back before it’s too late, Jonathan. I’m trying to protect you.”

“The constables found the man you killed. They found his head severed and one of those stakes in his heart. I’ll bring you straight to them, just as I should have before. Explain yourself now.”

“Jonathan, I beg you—”

“Tell me!”

He dropped his weapons to his sides. “Bar the door,” he said gravely. 

“What are you talking about?”

“Bar the door with that piece of stone there on the floor.” He set his stake on the lip of the sarcophagus. “Then come here. There’s no more time, so I have no choice but to show you.”

I dragged the large oblong stone across the doorway, then brandished my pistol again as I advanced towards him. Van Helsing stared back at me, unfazed by my threat. He braced one hand on something inside the sarcophagus and beckoned me with the other. “Look.” 

I looked into the coffin and my esophagus pulsed, forcing bile into my mouth. Margarethe von Messenbach lay motionless on a bed of earth, her body swollen to voluptuousness, blood seeping from the corners of her eyes and mouth. Leathery, worm-eaten flesh peeked out from beneath the soil, and a half-decomposed hand rested beside her face as if to caress it. I lost my grip on my pistol, which tumbled in beside her. Bracing myself on the edge of the sarcophagus, I gasped and spit. “What in God’s name happened to the baroness?” 

He reached down and pulled back her upper lip. In that bloody maw gleamed two white fangs. “A monster,” I breathed.

“A vampire,” Van Helsing replied. 

Something raced across the chapel floor and down the steps to the vault. Furious fists pounded on the door, which shook wildly on its hinges. 

“My valise is by my foot,” Van Helsing said. “Inside you will find a crucifix. Take it and your pistol and go back to the door. If he breaks through, I will need you to hold him.”

The door rattled against the stone barricade. I grabbed the crucifix, ran back to the vault entrance, and pressed it against the widening opening. The door groaned and splintered and a frenzied face hissed and snarled on the other side. 

From behind I heard the violent smack of wood into flesh, followed by a shriek so earsplitting that I went weak in the knees. The screams were quickly muffled and the scents of blood, burning meat, and garlic flowed into my nostrils. My opponent slammed into the door, toppling the stone and knocking me backward. Before he could enter the room, I regained my balance and leapt forward, forcing him against the wall, the crucifix searing his wrist.

“Hold him, Harker,” Van Helsing shouted. I stomped on the intruder’s foot and tightened my grip on his arms. In the distance, a blade fell. Blood gurgled and spurted. The stranger I held howled, then went slack and slid down the wall. I dropped down and pinned him again. Van Helsing walked over and knelt down beside me, his face and collar spattered with red. He pulled another crucifix from inside his jacket and held it before the stranger. 

“Don’t let go, not yet,” Van Helsing said with the unnerving calm of a surgeon. As the intruder moaned and wept, Van Helsing turned his head to the side, as though he were inspecting livestock. “You see there?” He gestured to a pair of scabbed-over puncture wounds on the man’s throat. “I suspect she was feeding on him.” He pressed his head against the wall and pushed up his lip, exposing his fangs. “Though this one is so weak, my guess is she was hardly feeding him in return.” 

“I will kill both of you,” the vampire whispered through gritted teeth, though he had gone so limp I doubted he could move. 

“Your mistress is dead.” Van Helsing declared. “You must die as well. But if you have not tasted human blood, there is hope for your soul yet if you help me.”

The stranger shuddered beneath my hands. His expression softened, as though an invisible vice had just released him. “I have not tasted man’s blood,” he said. “Rats, cattle, but not man. Please, put those dreadful things down, I cannot bear them.” 

Van Helsing did not remove his crucifix, and so nor did I. “Tell me who made you,” he said.

“I served Baroness Margarethe von Messenbach. She made me what I am.” 

“Are there others?”

“The Baroness devoured them all. She only made a beast of me.” 

“Tell me who made the Baroness.” 

The vampire’s eyes rolled up into his head. “They came from all over Europe when the Baron died. There were so many. I do not know.”

“I cannot spare you, but God may forgive you.” Van Helsing rose to his feet. “I will bring you to your rest. Lie down.” The vampire nodded wearily and slumped down on the floor. “Harker, place the stone over his left arm and leg, then hold down the limbs on his right.” I obeyed. The vampire shut his eyes and rolled his head to the side. Van Helsing brought over his mallet and stakes and wedged a bulb of garlic in the creature's mouth. 

Another stroke of the mallet. More plumes of blood. This vampire did not scream. 

I turned away and crawled a few feet deeper into the vault, where I wretched until it seemed there was nothing left inside of me. Van Helsing stooped down next to me and rested his hand on my back. “Now you understand,” he murmured, his breath warm against my ear. “Though, I would have given anything to keep you from witnessing what you have seen.”

He pulled me to my feet and led me up the steps into the chapel. A cold breeze flowed in from outside, and I felt like I could breathe again. He set me down in one of the pews, and then placed one of his crucifixes in an alcove above the altar. 

“I wish I had listened to you,” I said, craning my head back to gaze at the white ceiling. “But now it’s too late for me to forget. I know it.”

“What you encountered would have overwhelmed a lesser man,” Van Helsing replied. “You were quick-witted and brave, even in tracking me down. Perhaps especially in that.”

“‘Diseases of the blood'.” I chuckled to myself to fight my delirium. “Your ruse is a bad one, you should know. I saw right through it."

“Not to most, who are far less curious than you.” Van Helsing sat down beside me. “It was through my medical work that I discovered how quickly the cult of vampirism was spreading. My credentials have granted me access to the information I need to determine who these creatures are, or rather, who they were. When you told me the story of the Messenbach tragedies, I recognized circumstances that would attract the attention of a more powerful vampire. A power vacuum in a noble family. A grieving person vulnerable to the charms and promises of an interloper. The details in the newspapers and parish register supported my theory." 

I sat up. “But how would you have known to come to Karlstadt at all?” I realized the answer before he spoke. I reached into my satchel, pulled out his map, and spread it open on my lap.

He bit down on his lip, then smiled. “As a show of thanks, I will not ask how you obtained that.” He pointed to a golden cross above Salzburg. “These are places where I have destroyed a vampire.” He slid his finger to a circle over Trieste. “And these are places where I have evidence that they exist. As you can see, these locations are dispersed quite evenly across Europe. I suspect that there is a master vampire that is making this pattern by creating disciples in strategic places. By looking at where I have encountered vampires, I can sometimes infer other places where they might appear.”

“The vampire who attacked us and stole the map—you said you had never seen him before, but he recognized you enough to follow you,” I said. Though my body was exhausted, this puzzle reinvigorated my mind. “He must have suspected what you knew, and wanted to stop you.”

“He was not the master vampire, though I believe he had been sent by him. This lesser vampire did not give up his lord before he perished. ” Van Helsing looked down at the map and sighed. “Until I uncover who this master is, my search cannot end.” 

“Not your search,” I said, this time resting my hand upon his. “Ours.”


End file.
